Sausage linking machines form long strands of sausage links. The links are created by stuffing a cylindrical thin wall-casing with meat emulsion, and then portioning the filled casing to create the individual links. The casing material comes in the form of cylindrical sticks (called casings) that must be loaded into the sausage machines. When one casing is consumed, another must be loaded in its place. The casings are thirty feet or more in length but are compressed to a shirred telescopic condition so as to form a shirred casing of ten or twelve inches in length. When placed on a meat stuffing tube of the machine, the meat emulsion is extruded through a discharge end of the tube into the casing which is progressively slidably removed from the outer surface of the tube as it is progressively being penetrated by the stuffing tube and then sequentially filled with meat emulsion.
A clamping mechanism is typically used to release the shirred casings from the hopper into a position where they can be filled sequentially with meat emulsion.
A principal object of this invention is to provide an improved method and apparatus for loading casings onto the stuffing tube of a sausage making machine.
A further object of this invention is to provide a method and apparatus for loading the casings onto a stuffing tube of a sausage making machine without the use of clamps or the like.
A still further object of this invention is to provide a method and apparatus for loading casings onto the stuffing tube of a sausage making machine to avoid any bridging of the casings in the hopper before they are in a position for being filled with meat emulsion.
A still further object of this invention is to provide a method and apparatus for loading casings onto the stuffing tube of a sausage making machine which is efficient and which is relatively free from maintenance.
These and other objects will be apparent to those skilled in the art.